The graphical user interfaces (GUIs) of modern computer systems are software programs that permit users to interact with the systems via graphical images on the system displays. They often depict spatial relationships between conceptual elements using graphical images, such as windows, menus, and dialogs with a dynamic interface. For example, a menu dynamically unfolds from a selected element to establish a link to its “point of origin”. The same is true for windows as they open and close. This trend towards graphical depiction of context is becoming more popular as more powerful Central Processing Units (CPUs) and Graphics Processing Unit (GPUs) become available. These GUIs also distinguish modern computer systems and help provide an improved user experience. In a medical imaging workstation, multiple views of the same dataset are often displayed simultaneously, but little progress has been made in terms of offering dynamic interfaces to provide context.
Many existing visualization methods for medical images are applied directly to the data or some derivative thereof. Although useful, concurrent visualization across different locations and orientations of a workstation display can sometimes be difficult for users to understand. As an example, diseases such as bronchiectasis, asthma, cystic fibrosis and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) are characterized by abnormalities in airway dimensions, including the thickness of the walls and the size of the lumen (i.e., inner airway). Computed Tomography (CT) has become one of the primary means to depict and detect these abnormalities since the availability of high-resolution, near-isotropic data makes it possible to evaluate airways at oblique angles to the scanner plane. Presentation of oblique angles on existing workstations, when allowed, typically involves an interface as depicted in FIG. 1, which shows an example of a medical imaging workstation application for airway analysis. A traditional axial view 2 is shown in the upper left of the figure, along with a 3D view 3 of the segmented airways (upper middle), a cross-sectional view 4 of a selected location (upper right), and a straightened “fillet” view 5 (bottom left) along a selected airway path. All views show portions or derived data from the same 3D volume of the airway tree obtained by the CT imaging scanner. Cross hairs 6 and boxes 7 in the axial view 2 are used to depict a relation or correspondence between the different views.
However, the problem still remains to adequately demonstrate to the user how an oblique plane relates to the rest of the data. This type of visualization is very important to physicians and other health professionals in using a medical imaging workstation, so they can remain confident in the automatic calculation of oblique angles, and remain oriented with respect to the patient's anatomy. Current workstations simply update views with changes in user input, but not much is shown in terms of the direct correspondences between the different views.